WITH all the things to be outraged by, last week, it was interesting that so many readers had their buttons twisted over NBC’s hiring of Matt Millen, jettisoned as general manager of the Lions early in their 0-16 season. Before he was let go, Millen’s Detroit teams were a smooth 31-84.

To make matters seem even more absurd in addition to his wild-card games studio appearances, NBC has assigned Millen to its Super Bowl pre, post and halftime team! What, they couldn’t get Bozo? Charlie Manson?

Funny, thing though, had Millen not left his Fox NFL analyst’s gig in 2001 for the Lions’ job, he might today be widely known as one of the best football analysts on the tube. Not that the competition ever has been tough, but in 2001 he was heading in that direction. And few-to-none today would question his credibility as a football analyst.

Millen, from the time he was an All-America defensive tackle at Penn State, has been a good guy with whom to talk football and most anything else on or off the air.

No one thought Millen incompetent when in 2003 he hired Steve Mariucci, the former and mostly successful Niners coach. Under Mariucci, the Lions were 15-28. Mariucci since has become an NFL Network analyst. Few, if any, felt that to be a rotten hire.

We too often fall into the Chris Russo simpleton trap, equating a man’s character and overall worth to the world based on his W-L record (Russo remains in the Witless Protection Program). Such shallow reasoning would have made Ted Williams, perhaps the greatest hitter of all time, an equally accomplished manager of the Washington Senators.

And look at all the compromised and even crooked college coaches who have become football and basketball analysts. We don’t seem the least surprised or disturbed by that.

When one considers the pile of ugly circumstances that finally forced Jim Valvano out at North Carolina State, it’s difficult to fathom that he next quickly was allowed to become a valued ESPN analyst, then, having bravely confronted what would be his early death, a legendary and noble figure.

Barry Switzer wrote personal checks to his Oklahoma players, yet where was the indignation when he joined Fox? At Fox, he has worked alongside Jimmy Johnson, who, as the head coach at Oklahoma State, had no trouble watching his star defensive end Dexter Manley matriculate to his senior year while overlooking Manley’s slight academic deficiency: He could neither read nor write.

If there’s a gripe with NBC, it pre-dated Millen’s appearance. Upon returning to the NFL mix, NBC hired an army of big-name pregame studio analysts, essayists, kibitzers and stat-givers, several of whom have been, at best, feckless. That makes Millen a welcomed get.

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Perhaps because it was busy shooting worthless, same old crowd shots when Thursday’s Florida-Oklahoma game ended, Fox had all but missed a good on-field story. Tebow and OU defensive back Nic Harris were seen chatting and then embracing. Harris is the fellow who had declared Tebow overrated, the fellow Tebow was flagged for taunting late in the game. If viewers didn’t realize what Fox had, Fox was no help.

ESPN college hoops studio analyst and former Vermont coach Tom Brennan: “Any win on the road is a good win.” Don’t tell us, Coach, tell the poll-blinded ESPNers who don’t know an upset from a Buick. . . . Charles Emrick, father of Mike, passed last weekend.

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On the club’s Web site page for “Marlins Maidens” auditions, the photo of the posed, barely dressed models would cause one to think of the Florida Marlins as a massage parlor/escort service/strip club, featuring foul pole-dancing between innings. Fans are reminded to bring lots of singles.

The best thing about college bowl games that go to the wire is that we don’t have to suffer the terribly tired Gatorade dump ritual. . . . Eagles-Giants, today, ESPN’s Chris Mortensen reports.

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Cards, Vikes cannot sell out their playoff games, NBA arenas half-empty during Christmas break, Dodgers chop millions from payroll. And the Giants and Jets are demanding PSL payments while the Mets and Yanks have jacked up ticket prices. Thank goodness we live in the only part of the country not to get hit by hard times.

It gets so confusing. The Bloomberg Administration has announced it no longer will accept or solicit bribes from the Yanks and Mets? Or is it that the Yanks and Mets will no longer offer them? . . . WWE last week announced a 10-percent layoff from its workforce, including non-deceased performers.

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Luke La Valle III, New Yorker, NCAA champion fencer at Notre Dame, father, husband and a Word Trade Towers survivor of the 9/11 attacks, died New Year’s Eve from lung cancer. A non-smoker, he was 30. Donations in his memory can be made to Lung Cancer Research, c/o of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, NYC.